I cancelled my trip abroad because I was scared of coronavirus

I cancelled my trip abroad because I was scared of coronavirus: What it’s like having health anxiety in the face of a potential pandemic

Here I am sitting at my laptop and my heart is pounding. I’m having palpitations and my breathing is a little rapid. I haven’t even had too much coffee yet as I’ve slowly been nursing a black cup of coffee in front of me. I keep raising my hand to my forehead to check the temperature. Am I too hot? Too cold? It feels a little warm, I think. 

I get a news alert on my phone as it says that two British Airways staff test positive for Coronavirus or more officially now known as COVID-19. We just flew with BA a few days ago. My adrenaline starts to rise and I start to feel out of breath.

I quickly open the news alert and scan the article for where I know they’ll determine it was a staff member I came into contact with. It isn’t. They were baggage handlers from Heathrow. We flew from London Gatwick.

It does little to ease my already in overdrive thoughts. My husband read that sentence and said it doesn’t come across well, but the reality is, it’s not meant to. It literally doesn’t ease my mind whatsoever that someone who has contracted this is in a different airport or location. In my mind, I’ve already calculated that somehow, someway, I’ve come into contact with this already – confirmed or unconfirmed isn’t the issue. My health anxiety however, certainly is.

I have suffered from health anxiety for the past few years. After having a health scare three years ago where I got a scary diagnosis, only to be undiagnosed with it, I have struggled. I ended up being quite literally left in the dark for weeks while I started serious medication for an ailment that I apparently never had. 

During those few weeks I didn’t sleep and was panicked constantly. If I slept at all, I had nightmares about what was happening. I had been contacted by the Center for Disease Control where they retraced each and every step I’d had and every single place I’d been to. They were surprised I wasn’t hospitalized given my diagnosis. Weeks later, the end result concluded that it was a lab error that meant I was “in theory” fine. Physically at that point, I was alright. But the panic over those few weeks had ruined my mental capacity to return to “normal” thought and reason anymore.  

From there on out, I would suffer from health anxiety. Over the past few years my health anxiety has convinced me that I’m having a heart attack, there’s a lump in my breast, cancerous moles on my skin, a blood clot from deep vein thrombosis, a brain tumour, bronchitis, the flu, having a stroke… well, if you can find a name for it, I’ve probably thought I’d had it.

And frankly, aside from the panic and googling of symptoms each and every time something happens…. let’s face it, health anxiety is embarrassing to admit you have problems with. I know people who have actual health problems that require surgery, medication and some with a truly awful diagnosis.

Me? I’m embarrassed to admit that in reality I need to take a Xanax or Diazepam and calm the eff down. It sometimes feels like more than being a hypochondriac (I think – do tell me if I’m wrong). It’s exhausting and debilitating. An enhanced oddly specific form of anxiety.

Yes, I have been to CBT already. That’s known as Cognitive Behavioral Therapy. It’s where you can learn coping mechanisms to deal with these anxieties. To an extent, I did find it helpful. But you’re only allowed so many sessions before you’ve learned all the tricks of the trade and there’s little more they can teach you. In reality, I would probably benefit from more regular therapy sessions and it’s something I need to consider now that I’m finding it hard to cope once again.

Time does help. Ironically, over the past few months I’ve found myself thinking less about worst case scenarios for myself. I’d been enjoying life again without as much worry. Less affirming body checks each day (does that mole look OK? Is there a lump here?) and more enjoying my morning coffee and making plans for the day.

Then in January the first mentions of Coronavirus happened.

And my health anxiety progress went straight out the window. I’d been months free from Googling symptoms and here I was again. Not exactly thinking that I had it or Googling symptoms… but worried for what was to come in the world.

I began checking the news religiously. Every morning, night, and afternoon in between. My Twitter updates would inform me of the latest happenings. BBC news alerts would plague my thoughts – no pun intended. And I continued to worry. We had a trip planned to go to Chamonix in France in the middle of February. Guess who cancelled it because of fear and panic? Me, myself and I.

I’m once again, embarrassed to admit that I made my husband cancel a trip he’d booked us for Christmas because of my crippling health anxiety. This was before COVID-19 had really started to appear in Europe. I would wake up shaking in a panic that a week before we were set to leave, we cancelled the whole thing. Luckily, we hadn’t booked our hotel yet and somehow recouped a bit of our flight money – a rarity before airlines were offering free rebookings, etc.

I know that having health anxiety makes everyday things harder. I’d been avoiding London as much as I can, avoiding super big gatherings. I’m already a bit intense when it comes to germs. I am the queen of hand sanitizer when the world is in the best of conditions. Now? My hands are practically raw from the force that I’ve been washing them.

And now, as I write this, we’re in Florida. The woman who cancelled a trip to Europe prior to the larger spread of the outbreak… has now travelled when it seems to continue spreading the most. I know, I’m surprised that I’m here too. Even more surprised that we ended up going to the theme parks, surely, a hotbed for germs and large public gatherings.

I’ve had to take medication to cope, of course. But we had to come back to the United States for legal paperwork reasons that made travel plans unavoidable and family reasons brought us to Florida as well before we’ll be heading to New York.

My fear has rearranged itself lately. Less so that I will get coronavirus and be horribly ill. OK, I mean, it is a little bit. But even I’m surprised because by my standards, I usually am most concerned with myself first and others second. It’s not a selfish thing, it’s just a weird health anxiety thing that I think first and foremost I will get something. However, the likelihood is that we all have an equal chance to be exposed to something like this… 

As I mentioned before, health anxiety usually is something that you personally think you have. So coronavirus is a bizarre concept because I am worried that I will have it and also pass it onto others. Rather than my usual fears of cancers or strokes or you name it. My fear is that I will pass this onto family, friends and strangers with weaker immune systems. I am horrifically scared about someone catching this who’s immune system cannot cope. 

My heart literally broke at the news coverage in China and of course, when they went into lock down. I’m equally devastated by the recent news in Italy and countries as they continue to spread. As I write this, Italy have decided to put the country on lock down too. 

I’m just really scared all the time. I’m having trouble sleeping again and I feel like I’m trying to push through a normal daily lifestyle but I’m still worried. Maybe I’m silly for being so paranoid, but unfortunately my health anxiety pushes me towards that edge.

I don’t necessarily regret coming back to America right now, but I don’t feel great about the choice either considering everywhere is saying to stop non-essential travel. Though, I suppose, our travel really was essential.

I wish I could wave a magic wand and feel better about life right now, but I think I’m going to have to do my best to switch off from the news every now and then in order to regain some clarity and sanity. 

If you suffer from health anxiety or anxieties, just please know that you’re not alone. This potential coronavirus pandemic is a scary time in the world that we’re so used to freely traveling through. I feel so nervous and worried for others as well. I don’t have a takeaway for this blog post other than that in a scary time, while we may not exactly be wanting to shake hands or hug strangers, it’s probably important for us all to at least be kind to one another.

Be kind to your friends who are scared about COVID-19 even if you may not be as frightened. Kind to those who may be handling this a little differently than you. Check in on your friends or family who have anxiety or any health problems for that matter. Encourage those around you to be vigilant with hand washing and using hand sanitizer, especially if they are traveling.

Also I’d like to note, while we can and are allowed to be scared of catching it… we certainly shouldn’t be scared of catching it due to someone’s race or background. Viruses don’t respect borders, genders, ages, or the colour of our skin. 

If you need some help in looking to calming sources to keep you grounded, I very much recommend staying tuned into Matt Haig, author of Reasons to Stay Alive’s Twitter account. He continues to demonstrate why I love following him on there. Haig is informative, realistic, but also optimistic too. And that’s something we can all use, especially if we’re having trouble with this right now – like me. Also, some apps that can help are the Calm App and Headspace. 

If you have some other sources that are keeping your worry levels down, please do share them with me. The more resources, the merrier. 

And in the meantime… well, I guess I’m just going to continue to wash my hands as usual.

Kelly xox